Methods and systems for tracking media effects in a media effect index

ABSTRACT

Exemplary embodiments relate to the creation of a media effect index for group video conversations. Media effect application (e.g., in the form of graphical overlays, filters, sounds, etc.) may be tracked in a timeline during a chat session. The resulting index may be used to create a highlights reel, which may serve as an index into a live show or may be used to determine the best time to insert materials into a recording of the conversation. The index may be used to automatically detect events in the video feed, to allow viewers to skip ahead to exciting moments (e.g., represented by clusters of applications of particular types of media effects), to determine where each participant spoke in a discussion, or to provide a common “watch together” experience while multiple users watch a common video. An analysis of the index may be used for research or consumer testing.

BACKGROUND

Facial detection technology allows for the detection of a face in aphoto or video, and in some cases allows for individuals to beidentified based on their facial characteristics. Recently, facialdetection techniques have been used to apply overlays on faces, such asby adding a graphical mask over a face in a video.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1A depicts an exemplary interface for a video communication.

FIG. 1B depicts an exemplary frame from a video communication.

FIG. 1C depicts an exemplary technique for performing emotion detection.

FIG. 1D depicts an exemplary interface in which a media effect isapplied to a user based on a detected emotion.

FIG. 1E depicts an exemplary interface in which a media effect isapplied to multiple users based on a detected emotion.

FIG. 1F depicts an example of a drawing applied over a communicationsinterface.

FIG. 1G depicts an example of an audible media effect.

FIG. 2 depicts an exemplary system for recommending and/or applyingmedia effects.

FIG. 3A is an exemplary timeline of media effect application.

FIG. 3B is an exemplary data structure for holding a media effect index.

FIG. 4A is a flowchart depicting an exemplary procedure for generatingan index of media effect application.

FIG. 4B is a flowchart depicting an exemplary procedure for applying amedia effect timeline in various contexts.

FIG. 5A is a block diagram providing an overview of a system includingan exemplary centralized communications service;

FIG. 5B is a block diagram providing an overview of a system includingan exemplary distributed communications service;

FIG. 5C depicts the social networking graph of FIGS. 8A-8B in moredetail;

FIG. 6 is a block diagram depicting an example of a system for amessaging service;

FIG. 7 is a block diagram illustrating an exemplary computing devicesuitable for use with exemplary embodiments;

FIG. 8 depicts an exemplary communication architecture; and

FIG. 9 is a block diagram depicting an exemplary multicarriercommunications device.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

In addition to facial overlays, a number of media effects may be appliedduring a video conversation. For example, musical sound effects may beplayed, filters may be applied, other types of graphical modificationsmay be made, etc. These media effects may be applied manually by a useror may be applied automatically (e.g., based on a detected emotion).Because the media effects may be applied in order to emphasize anemotion or other characteristic of the user, the fact that the mediaeffect was applied at a given time may provide contextual informationabout the video. Exemplary embodiments track the application of mediaeffects in the video in order to extract and preserve such contextualinformation for a number of uses.

More specifically, exemplary embodiments relate to the creation of amedia effect index for group video conversations. Media effectapplication may be tracked during a communication session and entriesmay be created in the index corresponding to the media effectapplication. Media effects may be stored with a variety of information,such as the time the media effect was applied, the user the media effectwas applied to or by, an emotion associated with the media effect, anevent associated with the media effect, etc. The media effect index maybe created and maintained by a media effect server that applies themedia effects.

The resulting index may be used for a wide variety of purposes. Examplesinclude creating a highlights reel, determining the best time to insertmedia (such as promotional materials), automatically detecting events inthe video feed (such as homeruns in a baseball broadcast), searchinginto a video feed for events or exhibited emotions, skipping ahead toexciting moments, determining where each participant (e.g., in a paneldiscussion) spoke, etc. The index may also be analyzed for a number ofpurposes, such as consumer testing.

This brief summary is intended to serve as a non-limiting introductionto the concepts discussed in more detail below. However, beforediscussing further exemplary embodiments, a brief note on data privacyis first provided. A more detailed description of privacy settings andauthentication will be addressed in connection with the followingFigures.

A Note on Data Privacy

Some embodiments described herein make use of training data or metricsthat may include information voluntarily provided by one or more users.In such embodiments, data privacy may be protected in a number of ways.

For example, the user may be required to opt in to any data collectionbefore user data is collected or used. The user may also be providedwith the opportunity to opt out of any data collection. Before opting into data collection, the user may be provided with a description of theways in which the data will be used, how long the data will be retained,and the safeguards that are in place to protect the data fromdisclosure.

Any information identifying the user from which the data was collectedmay be purged or disassociated from the data. In the event that anyidentifying information needs to be retained (e.g., to meet regulatoryrequirements), the user may be informed of the collection of theidentifying information, the uses that will be made of the identifyinginformation, and the amount of time that the identifying informationwill be retained. Information specifically identifying the user may beremoved and may be replaced with, for example, a generic identificationnumber or other non-specific form of identification.

Once collected, the data may be stored in a secure data storage locationthat includes safeguards to prevent unauthorized access to the data. Thedata may be stored in an encrypted format. Identifying informationand/or non-identifying information may be purged from the data storageafter a predetermined period of time.

Although particular privacy protection techniques are described hereinfor purposes of illustration, one of ordinary skill in the art willrecognize that privacy protected in other manners as well. Furtherdetails regarding data privacy are discussed below in the sectiondescribing network embodiments.

Assuming a user's privacy conditions are met, exemplary embodiments maybe deployed in a wide variety of messaging systems, including messagingin a social network or on a mobile device (e.g., through a messagingclient application or via short message service), among otherpossibilities. An overview of exemplary logic and processes for engagingin synchronous video conversation in a messaging system is next provided

As an aid to understanding, a series of examples will first be presentedbefore detailed descriptions of the underlying implementations aredescribed. It is noted that these examples are intended to beillustrative only and that the present invention is not limited to theembodiments shown.

Exemplary Interfaces

Reference is now made to the drawings, wherein like reference numeralsare used to refer to like elements throughout. In the followingdescription, for purposes of explanation, numerous specific details areset forth in order to provide a thorough understanding thereof. However,the novel embodiments can be practiced without these specific details.In other instances, well known structures and devices are shown in blockdiagram form in order to facilitate a description thereof. The intentionis to cover all modifications, equivalents, and alternatives consistentwith the claimed subject matter.

In the Figures and the accompanying description, the designations “a”and “b” and “c” (and similar designators) are intended to be variablesrepresenting any positive integer. Thus, for example, if animplementation sets a value for a=5, then a complete set of components122 illustrated as components 122-1 through 122-a may include components122-1, 122-2, 122-3, 122-4, and 122-5. The embodiments are not limitedin this context.

FIG. 1A depicts an interface 100 for a communications applicationadapted to show a group or one-to-one video call. The interface 100 maybe displayed on the device of a first user. The interface 100 mayinclude a preview window 102, in which the first user can see the videofeed that they are current sending to the rest of the participants.

The interface 100 may further include a main window 104 in which thespeaker that has been currently selected as most-relevant is shown. Themain window 104 may be the most prominent window in the interface 100,and may display a video feed that is larger in size and/or at a higherresolution than the video in the preview window 102 or other windows(such as the roster 108 described below).

Optionally, the participant displayed in the main window 104 may beidentified on the interface 100 by an identifier 106. The identifier 106may be, for example, the name or handle of the participant displayed inthe main window 104.

A roster 108 of participants in the call may also be displayed. Theroster 108 may include a window 108-i dedicated to each participant inthe call, or may exclude the currently-relevant speaker displayed in themain window 104. Each window 108-i may display a video feed of theassociated participant (if such a feed is available). The roster 108 maybe associated with some functionality. For example, selecting one of thewindows 108-i (as shown in FIG. 1A) may lock the selected participant tothe main window for a period of time (or until the locking is manuallycanceled, or until an event occurs, such as another video feed becomingmost relevant). Alternatively or in addition, selecting a window 108-imay cause additional information about the associated participant to bedisplayed, among other possibilities. The windows 108-i of the roster108 may each be associated with an identifier 110-i identifying theparticipant in the window 108-i. The identifier 110-i may be, forexample, a name or handle of the participant. In some cases, theparticipant may be associated with a long identifier and a shortidentifier (e.g., a full name and a nickname, or a full name and a firstname only). In some embodiments, the short identifier may be displayedas the identifier 110-i, while the longer identifier may be displayed asthe identifier 106 for the main window 104.

FIG. 1B depicts an exemplary frame from a video communication. The framemay be, for example, an image from a video feed. The frame may include aparticipant's face 112. Analysis of the face 112 may be used to performemotion detection, as shown in FIG. 1C.

Facial detection techniques may be applied to determine a bounding shape116 that substantially contains the user's face 112. In some cases, itmay be difficult to entirely encompass the user's face with a relativelysimple bounding shape 116, and so some small portions of the face mayextend beyond the boundaries of the bounding shape 116. Furthermore,because few people have perfectly square or oval faces, the boundingshape 116 may include some areas that do not contain the user's face.Preferably, the bounding shape 116 is sized and shaped so as to fit asmuch of the user's face in as possible, while avoiding encompassingareas that do not include the face. Further preferably, the boundingshape 116 is a relatively simple shape, such as a square or oval, ratherthan a relatively complex shape, such as a trapezoid or freeform curve.

Optionally, one or more axes of the bounding shape 116 may be defined.In the depicted example, the facial detection technique involvesidentifying features of the face, such as the ears, eyes, nose, andmouth. A vertical axis extends vertically through the approximate centerof the face, splitting the eyes, nose, and mouth in half. A horizontalaxis extends horizontally through the approximate center of the face,approximately through the ears and eyes.

The face may also be analyzed to identify especially expressivefeatures, which may be particularly relevant to emotion detection. Forexample, the region corresponding to the eyes and mouth may beconsidered to be more expressive than (e.g.) the ears or hair.Accordingly, one or more expressive regions 118-1, 118-2, 118-3 may bedrawn around the expressive features and analyzed for indications ofemotion type (e.g., upturned or downturned mouth, raised or loweredeyebrows, furrowed brow, etc.).

As an alternative or in addition to the techniques above, other inputsmay be used to perform emotion detection. For example, an audio feed maybe analyzed to detect changes in a user's voice. Other sensor data maybe used to detect characteristics associated with emotional states, aswell. For instance, a heart rate monitor may detect an increased ordecreased pulse; a fingerprint sensor may measure skin conductivity; anaccelerometer or orientation sensor may detect a user's hand stabilityas the user holds their mobile device, etc. These and othercharacteristics may be associated with certain emotional states.

After the user's emotional state is detected, the system mayautomatically apply a media effect associated with the detectedemotional state. FIG. 1D depicts an exemplary interface in which mediaeffects 120-1, 120-2, 120-3 are applied to a user based on a detectedemotion. In this case, the system has detected a “happy” emotional stateand applied a “happy” media effect (a graphical overlay with anexaggerated animation showing a smile and happy eyes).

The system may select and automatically apply a default media effectassociated with the emotional state. Alternatively, the system mayselect and apply a media effect based on user preferences (e.g., apredetermined media effect selected by the user in advance), and/orbased on previous user-applied media effects (e.g., media effects thatthe user has previously selected for application, particularly whenapplied during or close in time to the occurrence of the same or asimilar emotional state as the detected emotional state).

Multiple different media effects may be associated with an emotionalstate. In some embodiments, upon detecting an emotional state, thesystem may display an indication of the emotional state (e.g., an iconassociated with the emotional state, or text identifying the emotionalstate). A user may select one of the multiple media effects associatedwith the emotional state through different inputs. For example, on atouch display, a user may swipe left to apply a first media effect,swipe up to apply a second media effect, etc. In another example, a usermay move the camera left, right, up, down, etc. to apply different mediaeffects. Other techniques for selecting among predetermined orpreselected media effects may also be used.

The media effect may be added to the user's video stream and broadcastto other users, so that other participants in the conversation mayexperience the media effect. In some embodiments, a media effect mayapply to a different participant than the participant who applied themedia effect, or may apply to multiple users in a coordinated manner.For example, FIG. 1E depicts an interface in which a media effect isapplied to multiple users based on a detected emotion.

In this case, the system detected an emotional state (e.g., a romanticemotional state) associated with a first participant (Jill) directed toa second participant (Jack). The system therefore applies a romanticmedia effect to both Jill's and Jack's video feeds. In this case, ananimated kissing media effect 122-1 appears in Jill's display, initiallycentered on Jill's mouth. The effect 122-1 appears to fly to the edge ofJill's screen and disappears. It reappears as a media effect 122-2 onJack's display and flies to Jack's cheek. Each participant in theconversation is able to see this coordinated media effect. Otherexamples may include animating an angry user's face as a dragon andshowing the user breathing fire on another user, throwing snowballs,etc.

The multi-user media effect may be applied to the original (selecting)user for whom the emotional state was detected and at least one otheruser. The other user may be, for example, the currently-active user(e.g., the user that is currently speaking or otherwise considered to bemost relevant), another user having the same emotional state, a userassociated with a portion of the display at which the original user iscurrently looking (e.g., if the user is staring at another user's videofeed and feeling an emotion that triggers a multi-user media effect, themedia effect may be targeted at the other user's video feed), or aselected other user.

In some embodiments, the media effects may be automatically applieddirectly. In other cases, multiple candidate media effects may beidentified, and a set of recommended media effects may be automaticallypresented.

Media effects are not limited to animations. For example, an icon for athird recommended media effect 126-3 allows the user to apply an audioeffect to the video feed. Another type of media effect is a drawing ordoodle applied over a display, as shown in FIG. 1F.

In this example, a first participant (Jill) interacts with atouch-screen display to draw one or more lines or shapes 128 on thecommunications interface (in this case, the main window displaying asecond participant, Jack). An example of the first participant's displayas the user draws the shape is shown in the upper half of FIG. 1F.

Graphics data may be transmitted as a media effect and applied to thedisplays of other users. The second participant's display is shown inthe bottom half of FIG. 1F. In this example, Jack is displayed in thepreview window, and the line/shape 128 is drawn in the appropriatelocation in the preview window.

Other participants would also see the graphic applied over the portionof the display corresponding to the second participant. In otherembodiments, any drawn graphics or doodles may be displayed in the mainwindow, regardless of the user currently displayed in the main window.

Media effects need not necessarily be graphics. For example, FIG. 1Gdepicts an example of an audible media effect 130. In this case,triggering the media effect causes a song or recording to be played onparticipant's devices.

The above interfaces are intended to be non-limiting examples of appliedmedia effects. Other types of media effects, such as modifying abackground, applying a filter, etc. are also contemplated within thescope of the present application.

Next, an exemplary configuration for a system that applies media effectsin a group conversation is described with reference to FIG. 2.

Exemplary System Configuration

FIG. 2 depicts an exemplary system for recommending and/or applyingmedia effects. Media effects may be applied automatically, manually, ora combination of both. A sending client 202-1 may be a device associatedwith a first participant in a video conversation. The sending client202-1 may be, for example a mobile device (although the presentinvention is not limited to application by mobile devices) executing acommunications application 204-1 for participating in a videocommunication with one or more other participants.

The communications application 204-1 may cause information associatedwith the video conversation to be transmitted to one or more serversthat facilitate the conversation. For example, the information mayinclude video data 208 containing graphical frames associated with theconversation, audio data 212 containing sound information to besynchronized with the graphical frames, and control data 216. Thecontrol data 216 may include various instructions, identifiers, etc.used to apply media effect that are synchronized to the video data 208and the audio data 212.

Each type of data may be transmitted in an associated channel. Forexample, the communications application 204-1, or another component ofthe client 202-1, may open a video channel 206, an audio channel 210,and a control channel 214 with the media effect server 218. The videochannel 206 may carry only video data 208 in a video format. Thus, themedia effect server 218 may treat any data received on the video channel206 as data in a video format and may process the data appropriately.Similarly, the audio channel 210 may carry only audio data 212 in anaudio format.

The control channel 214 may transmit generic data that is notnecessarily in a predetermined format, or may transmit controlinstructions in a specified control format. For example, the controlchannel 214 may carry an instruction to analyze the video data 208and/or audio data 212 for emotional characteristics, or may carry aninstruction to apply a media effect. The control channel 214 may be, forexample, a Web Real Time Communications (WebRTC) channel.

The video channel 206, audio channel 210, and control channel may carryinformation in both directions. Thus, for example, the video channel 206and audio channel 210 may carry data for display/playback on the sendingclient 202-1 (e.g., data relating to the video feeds of one or morerecipient clients 202-2, 202-3, 202-4). The control channel 214 maycarry recommendations from the media effect server 218, one or moreidentified emotional states, other instructions, etc.

The media effect server 218 may be configured to analyze the video data208 and/or audio data 212 using emotion detection logic 220 fordetecting an emotional state associated with the video data 208 and/oraudio data 212. The media effect server 218 may also store a mediaeffect library 222, which includes a number of available media effectsand one or more associated emotional states that are paired with themedia effects. The media effects may be identified by an identifier, andthe media effect library 222 may optionally mirror a media effectlibrary stored locally at the client devices 202.

The media effect server 218 may further include audiovisual compilationlogic 224 for combining the video data 208, the audio data 212, and anyapplied media effects. The audiovisual compilation logic 224 may includelogic for synchronizing the audio data 212 with the video data 208, andfurther for synchronizing the media effects with the combinedaudio/video data (or with the audio data 212 or video data 208individually).

Once combined, the resultant audiovisual data 230 may be transmittedfrom the media effect server 218 to a broadcast server 226. Thebroadcast server 226 may include broadcast logic 228 that identifies oneor more recipient clients 202-2, 202-3, 202-4 associated with the videocommunication. The broadcast server 226 may transmit the audiovisualdata 230, which includes the audio data 212, the video data 208, and theapplied media effects, to each of the recipient clients 202-2, 202-3,202-4.

As media effects are received and applied by the media effect server218, the media effect server 218 may create and maintain a media effectindex. A description of an exemplary media effect index is nextdescribed with reference to FIGS. 3A and 3B.

Media Effect Index

A media effect index may store information regarding the context inwhich media effects are deployed. For example, FIG. 3A is an exemplarytimeline 300 of media effect application in a video feed.

Initially, a media effect is applied to a first user as a first usermedia effect 302. For example, the media effect server may determinewhile the first user is speaking that the first user's video feed isassociated with an emotional state, and the media effect server mayautomatically apply the first user media effect 302. Alternatively, thefirst user may manually apply the first user media effect 302, oranother user may apply the first user media effect 302 to the firstuser.

Shortly thereafter, a second user begins to speak and another mediaeffect is applied to a second user as a second user media effect 304.The first user then begins speaking again, and a third media effect isapplied to the first user as a first user media effect 306.

As in the above example, media effects are often (though not always)applied to the currently active speaker. The active speaker is often,though not always, the participant that is shown in the main window ofthe video conversation. In some cases, a media effect may be applied toa non-active (or non-dominant) participant. This may cause thenon-active participant to become the participant that is most relevantto the current conversation, and the non-active participant may be shownin the main window instead of the active or dominant speaker. Trackingmedia effect application may therefore provide information as to who iscurrently speaking and/or which participant is currently most relevantto the conversation.

Returning to the video call tracked in the timeline 300, at this pointin the conversation some sort of event may occur. For example, the firstuser may say something funny, and the three participants may laugh.Alternatively, something exciting or shocking may occur, and the threeusers may undergo emotional reactions in quick succession. The mediaeffect server may detect these emotional reactions and apply mediaeffects to each of the users. Accordingly, the first three media effectsare followed in a relatively short period of time by yet another mediaeffect applied to the first user (First User Media Effect 308), anothermedia effect applied to the second user (Second User Media Effect 310),and a media effect applied to the third user (Third User Media Effect312).

The presence of events that trigger emotional responses may be detectedby defining a threshold period of time 314 and determining whether acluster (e.g., more than a predetermined number) of media effects areapplied within the threshold period of time 314. For example, as shownin FIG. 3A, application of the first user media effect 302, the seconduser media effect 304, and the third user media effect 306 do notsignify the occurrence of an event, because they are spaced apart bymore than the threshold period of time 314. On the other hand, the firstuser media effect 308, the second user media effect 310, and the thirduser media effect 312 do signify the presence of an event, because theyfall within the threshold period of time 314 with respect to each other.Thus, these latter media effects may be assigned to or associated withan event.

Information about the applied media effects, the emotional stateassociated with the media effects, and any events related to the mediaeffects may be stored in a media effect index, such as the exemplaryindex 350 depicted in FIG. 3B.

The index 350 may include one or more entries 352. Each entry 352 may bemade up of a number of fields for storing data values.

For example, a media effect ID field 354 may store an identifierassociated with the applied media effect. The identifier may designate atype or name of the media effect applied (e.g., “happy_face_animation”or media effect number “123”). Alternatively or in addition, the mediaeffect ID field 354 may store a unique designator for a particular mediaeffect (e.g., the specific first user media effect 302).

A time 356 field may identify a time during the video conversation atwhich the media effect was applied. The time may be, for example, atimestamp indicating the time of day at which the effect was applied, arelative time from the beginning or end of the video conversation or aparticular point in the video conversation (e.g., since a break in thevideo conversation), a time since the application of the previous mediaeffect or since the occurrence of an event, etc.

The entry 352 may also include an applied user ID 358, indicating theconversation participant to which the media effect was applied, andoptionally an applying user ID 360 indicating a user that applied themedia effect to the applying user. The user IDs 358, 360 may identifythe users by a designator such as a handle, an identification number, orany other suitable identifier.

The entry 352 may optionally include metadata 362 describing contextualinformation about the application of the media effect. Examples ofmetadata 362 include an event ID 364 identifying an event with which themedia effect is associated, and emotion information 366 indicating atype of emotion whose detection led to the application of the mediaeffect.

The index 350 may include more or fewer parameters than those depicted.For example, in some embodiments, the media effect index may also trackthe dominant or most-relevant participant in the conversation (e.g., theparticipant who is shown in the main window at any given time). Theparameters may be applied in any suitable combination.

Next, exemplary methods for generating and using a media effect indexare described in connection with FIGS. 4A-4B.

Exemplary Methods

FIG. 4A is a flowchart depicting exemplary logic 400 for generating anindex of media effect application.

At block 402, an input may be received at a system (such as the mediaeffects server). The input may be a command, instruction, or other typeof request. The input may be received on the above-described controlchannel. The input may be evaluated in order to determine a type of theinput.

In some embodiments, the input may be an output of the media effectserver, such as in the case where the media effect server analyzes videoframe information from a video feed and automatically applies (orrecommends application of) a media effect.

At block 404, it may be determined whether the input is an instructionto apply a media effect. If the decision at block 404 is “YES” (i.e.,the input was a media effect application, then processing may proceed toblock 406.

At block 406, the system may receive the media effect to be applied. Ifthe media effect is stored locally in a media effect library, the mediaeffect may be retrieved from the local storage. For example, the inputmay designate a media effect based on a media effect identifier, and theidentifier may be used as an index to look up the appropriate mediaeffect. If the media effect is stored remotely, the system may retrievethe media effect. Alternatively or in addition, a copy of the mediaeffect may be supplied with the input received at block 402.

At block 408, the system may apply the media effect. For example, thesystem may access video data on the video channel and audio data on theaudio channel, incorporate the media effect into the audio and/or videodata, and synchronize the data for transmission to the broadcastingserver.

In some embodiments, the media effect need not necessarily be applied inorder to be recorded in the media effect index. For example, the systemmay detect an emotional state that would trigger a media effect, but theuser may cancel application of the media effect (or user settings maypreclude application of the media effect). In this case, informationabout the media effect may still be recorded in the media effect index,optionally along with a flag indicating that the media effect was notapplied. This information may be useful in generating timelines andperforming searches, as described below in connection with FIG. 4B.

At block 410, the system may access an index of media effectapplications. The index may be stored locally, at the system, orremotely. The index may be distributed among several devices (e.g., eachclient may maintain its own index tracking application of its own mediaeffects, or tracking application of all media effects). If the indexdoes not yet exist locally (e.g., because the media effect applied inblock 408 was the first media effect applied in a conversation and theindex was not automatically generated when the conversation commenced),then at block 410 the index may be created.

At block 412, the system may record the application of the media effectin the index.

The system may identify the media effect applied based on an ID. Themedia effect ID may be, for example, specified in the input, may bereceived as part of the media effect. Alternatively or in addition, themedia effect may be assigned a new descriptor that is maintained by thesystem. The media effect may be analyzed or processed in order togenerate a unique ID (e.g., a hash of the audio or video data of themedia effect may be used as an identifier of the media effect). Themedia effect ID may be an index into a media effect library.

The system may identify a time at which the media effect was applied.The time may be a relative time (e.g., relative to the start of thevideo conversation, an event or break in the video conversation, thelast time at which a media effect was applied, etc.). The time may benon-relative (e.g., a local time as recorded by the system).

The system may identify the participant(s) that the media effect wasapplied to and/or by. If the media effect was associated with emotiondata (e.g., the media effect was applied as a result of a detectedemotion, or the media effect is otherwise associated with an emotiontype), then the emotion data may also be identified.

Any or all of the above information may be stored in the media effectindex at block 412. Additional characteristics may also be stored withthe above-described information.

At block 414, the system may process information in the index toidentify further characteristics of the data. For example, the systemmay, at block 416, identify one or more clusters of media effectapplications based on the time values stored on different entries in theindex. If more than a predetermined number (e.g., two or more, three ormore, etc.) of media effects were applied within a predetermined periodof time (e.g., one second, two seconds, five seconds, etc.), then themedia effects may be associated with an event identifier at block 418.In some embodiments, only media effects having corresponding emotiontypes (e.g., shocked, happy, etc.) may be associated with the eventidentifier.

Processing may then return to block 402 and a new input may beprocessed.

Returning to block 404, if the decision at this block is “NO” (i.e., theinput was not a media effect application), then processing may proceedto block 420 and it may be determined if the input was a request forinformation or action relating to the media effect index. If thedecision at block 420 is “YES,” then processing may proceed to block 422and the logic 452 described in connection with FIG. 4B may be carriedout. Processing may then return to block 402 and another input may beprocessed.

If the decision at block 420 is “NO” (i.e., the input was not arequest), then processing may proceed to block 424 and the input may beprocessed according to other logic designated for the type of inputprovided. Processing may then return to block 402 and another input maybe processed.

Turning to FIG. 4B, exemplary logic 450 for applying a media effecttimeline in various contexts is depicted.

At block 452, the system may receive an input. The input may be, forexample, the type of input received at block 402 in FIG. 4A. The inputmay include a request to perform an action or generate an output, whichmay be identified (for example) by a request-ID or request type.Accordingly, the system may determine (e.g., based on the request-ID orrequest type) a type of request received.

At block 454, the system may determine if the input was a request tosearch the index based on provided criteria. If so, processing mayproceed to block 456. At block 456, the system may search the mediaeffect index based on one or more criteria provided in the input.

For example, the search request may include a request to identify anymedia effects applied to a particular user. The system may thereforesearch the media effect index based on the Applied UID 358 and returnany results matching the search query. Similarly, the search request mayinclude a request to identify media effects associated with a particularemotion type, a particular event ID, a particular applying user, oreffects received at a certain time or in a certain time range. Thesearch request may include conditions and may specify the conditionsthrough the use of conjunctive or disjunctive operators (e.g., AND, OR,NOT, XOR), among other possibilities. Block 456 may return a set ofmedia effect entries that match the search criteria.

At block 458, any returned results may be transmitted to the originatorof the request. Processing may then return to block 452 and a new inputmay be processed.

At block 460, the system may determine whether the request was a requestto skip to a location identified by a provided criteria. For example, aclient device may be currently playing back a previously-recorded videoconversation and may request to skip ahead to an event or media effectapplication. Alternatively or in addition, the client device may beengaged in an ongoing conversation, and the request may be a request toreturn to or replay a portion of the video conversation corresponding tothe search criteria. If so, processing may proceed to block 462.

At block 462, the system may perform a search based on the criteriatransmitted with the request. For example, if the request is simply arequest to skip ahead to the next media effect application (or backwardsto a previous media effect application), the request may identify thecurrent playback time of the video conversation. The system may searchforwards or backwards from the identified time in the media effectindex, and may return the next/previous result.

The request might also be a request to skip to a particular pointidentified by the criteria. In this case, the criteria may be similar tothose described in connection with the search functionality at blocks454-456, and the system may perform a similar search to identify themedia effects and/or times corresponding to the search criteria.

At block 464, the system may return a playback time at which thecriteria are fulfilled. If more than one time meets the criteria, thesystem may return the next time at which the criteria are fulfilled.Processing may then proceed to block 458 and the identified playbacktime maybe transmitted.

At block 466, the system may determine if the request was a request togenerate a highlights reel. For example, a client device may transmit arequest to identify highlights or key occurrences in a video includingmedia effects, and to deliver a shortened video including only thehighlights or key events. If so, processing may proceed to block 468.

At block 468, the system may search the media effect index for events(e.g., identified based on clusters of media effect applications, asdescribed above), and may return a list of the events. The events may bedesignated so as to precede the application of the first media effect inreaction to the event, and to continue until after the final applicationof the last media effect in reaction to the event. Video, image, and/oraudio processing may be performed around the clustered media effects inorder to identify when the event starts and/or finishes. Alternativelyor in addition, the event may be identified as occupying predeterminedamounts of time before and/or after the cluster of media effects inresponse to the event.

At block 470, the system may generate a video reel that includes theevents identified at block 468. Processing may then proceed to block 458and the video reel maybe transmitted.

At block 472, the system may determine if the request was a request togenerate a timeline of speakers in the conversation. If so, processingmay proceed to block 474.

At block 474, the system may search the media effect index for mediaeffects that are consecutively applied to the same participant. In manycases, media effects are applied while the participant is speaking. Inorder to confirm that this is the case, the system may perform audio,video, and/or image processing to verify that the media effect isapplied to a person who is speaking. Alternatively or in addition,confidence in whether a particular participant is speaking may beevaluated based on the number of media effects applied consecutively tothe participant and/or the type of media effects applied by theparticipant and/or other participants. For example, a single mediaeffect applied to a participant might indicate that the participant isreacting to something that someone else has said, whereas multiple mediaeffects may indicate that the participant is the primary speaker in theconversation and is maintaining the interest of other users. Similarly,a “surprised” or “laughing” media effect may indicate that theparticipant is reacting to something that has occurred in the video feed(without the participant necessarily being the speaker), whereas an“incredulous,” “consoling,” or “encouraging” media effect type mightindicate that the person is currently speaking.

If the media effect index stores entries relating to the dominant ormost relevant participant, as in some embodiments, then this informationmay also be used to determine which participant is speaking at whichtime.

The media effects may be used to determine, for different times in thevideo, a confidence value as to which participant is currently speaking.Thus, a confidence gradient may be defined over the course of the video,with different participants identified as the more likely speaker atdifferent times. As the confidence value for one participant decreasesover time and another's increases, the system may identify likelytransitions between speakers. The transitions may optionally beconfirmed through audio, video, or image processing.

At block 476, the system may generate a timeline based on thetransitions identified at block 474. The timeline may include times atwhich the speaking participant transitioned from one person to another.Processing may then proceed to block 458 and the generated timelinemaybe transmitted.

At block 478, the system may determine whether the request was a requestto generate an emotion timeline. An emotion timeline may represent atimeline of when media effects representing different emotions areapplied, which may be analyzed (e.g.) for market research, consumertesting, or other applications in which the reactions of a group ofpeople are relevant.

If it is determined at block 478 that the request is a request for anemotion timeline, then at block 480, the system may search the mediaeffect index for the same or similar groups of emotions. The search maybe performed in a method similar to that described at block 456.

At block 482, the system may generate a timeline of emotions, in asimilar manner to the timeline of speakers generated at block 476. Forexample, given the emotion type associated with different media effectsapplied over time, the system may identify a predominant type ofassociated emotion at different times over the course of the video. Thesystem may generate a confidence score that may change over time in thevideo, and may identify transitions between different emotion types.

Alternatively or in addition, different emotion types may be present atthe same time, and the system may maintain a tally of the differentemotion types present in a given scene, and/or a ratio of differentemotion types. For example, if the video is a focus group testing aproduct or idea, some participants may react positively while others mayreact negatively. The system may detect application of media effectsbased on these emotional states.

In some embodiments, the system may be configured to track emotionalstate and times at which media effects could be employed, withoutactually applying the media effects (e.g., when recording a focusgroup). This information may be relied upon in blocks 480 and 482.

The processing of the media effects may be supplemented by audio, video,or image processing to determine predominant emotion types.

Upon determining predominant emotions and/or numbers of different typesof emotions experienced over time in the video, the system may formatthe resulting information into a timeline and transmit the emotiontimeline at block 458.

If the input does not correspond to any of the above-identified options,then processing may proceed to block 486 and the input may be processedaccording to other logic suitable for the input provided. Processing maythen return to block 452 and a new input may be processed.

Messaging System Overview

These examples may be implemented by a communications system that isprovided either locally, at a client device, or remotely (e.g., at aremote server). FIGS. 5A-5C depict various examples of communicationssystems, and are discussed in more detail below.

FIG. 5A depicts an exemplary centralized communications system 500generally arranged to receive, store, and deliver video communications.The centralized system 500 may implement some or all of the structureand/or operations of a communications service in a single computingentity, such as entirely within a single centralized server device 526.

The communications system 500 may include a computer-implemented systemhaving software applications that include one or more components.Although the communications system 500 shown in FIG. 5A has a limitednumber of elements in a certain topology, the communications system 500may include more or fewer elements in alternate topologies.

A client device 510 may transmit communications addressed to one or morerecipient users, user accounts, or other identifiers resolving to one ormore receiving client devices 510. In exemplary embodiments, each of theclient devices 510 and their respective communications clients 520 areassociated with a particular user or users of the communications service500. In some embodiments, the client devices 510 may be cellular devicessuch as smartphones and may be identified to the communications service500 based on a phone number associated with each of the client devices510. In some embodiments, each communications client may be associatedwith a user account registered with the communications service 500. Ingeneral, each communications client may be addressed through varioustechniques for the reception of communications. While in someembodiments the client devices 510 may be cellular devices, in otherembodiments one or more of the client devices 510 may be personalcomputers, tablet devices, any other form of computing device.

The client 510 may include one or more input devices 512 and one or moreoutput devices 518. The input devices 512 may include, for example,microphones, keyboards, cameras, electronic pens, touch screens, andother devices for receiving inputs including communications data,requests, commands, user interface interactions, selections, and othertypes of input. The output devices 518 may include a speaker, a displaydevice such as a monitor or touch screen, and other devices forpresenting an interface to the communications system 500.

The client 510 may include a memory 519, which may be a non-transitorycomputer readable storage medium, such as one or a combination of a harddrive, solid state drive, flash storage, read only memory, or randomaccess memory. The memory 519 may a representation of an input 514and/or a representation of an output 516, as well as one or moreapplications. For example, the memory 519 may store a communicationsclient 520 and/or a social networking client that allows a user tointeract with a social networking service.

The input 514 may be textual, such as in the case where the input device212 is a keyboard. Alternatively, the input 514 may be an audiorecording, such as in the case where the input device 512 is amicrophone and/or a video recording, such as in the case where the inputdevice 512 is a camera. The input 514 may be subjected to automaticspeech recognition (ASR) logic in order to transform an audio recordingto text that is processable by the communications system 500. The ASRlogic may be located at the client device 510 (so that the audiorecording is processed locally by the client 510 and corresponding textis transmitted to the messaging server 526), or may be located remotelyat the messaging server 526 (in which case, the audio recording may betransmitted to the messaging server 526 and the messaging server 526 mayprocess the audio into text). Other combinations are also possible—forexample, if the input device 512 is a touch pad or electronic pen, theinput 514 may be in the form of handwriting, which may be subjected tohandwriting or optical character recognition analysis logic in order totransform the input 512 into processable text.

The client 510 may be provided with a network interface 522 forcommunicating with a network 524, such as the Internet. The networkinterface 522 may transmit the input 512 in a format and/or using aprotocol compatible with the network 524 and may receive a correspondingoutput 516 from the network 524.

The network interface 522 may communicate through the network 524 to acommunications server 526. The communications server 526 may beoperative to receive, store, and forward communications betweencommunications clients.

The communications server 526 may include a network interface 522,communications preferences 528, and communications logic 530. Thecommunications preferences 528 may include one or more privacy settingsfor one or more users and/or communications. Furthermore, thecommunications preferences 528 may include one or more settings,including default settings, for the logic described herein.

The communications logic 530 may include index generation logic 532 thatis operable to generate a media effect index. The communications logic530 may further include index application logic 534 that is operable toprocess requests relating to the index and transmit the results of therequests to the client 510.

In some embodiments, communications may be sent peer-to-peer betweenusers without the use of intervening server devices such as mayimplement the communications service 500. In these embodiments, thecommunications logic 530, including the index generation logic 532 andthe index application logic 534, may reside on the client devices 510.

The network interface 522 of the client 510 and/or the communicationsserver 526 may also be used to communicate through the network 524 witha social networking server 536. The social networking server 536 mayinclude or may interact with a social networking graph 538 that definesconnections in a social network. Furthermore, the communications server526 may connect to the social networking server 536 for variouspurposes, such as retrieving connection information, messaging history,event details, etc. from the social network.

A user of the client 510 may be an individual (human user), an entity(e.g., an enterprise, business, or third-party application), or a group(e.g., of individuals or entities) that interacts or communicates withor over the social networking server 536. The social-networking server536 may be a network-addressable computing system hosting an onlinesocial network. The social networking server 536 may generate, store,receive, and send social-networking data, such as, for example,user-profile data, concept-profile data, social-graph information, orother suitable data related to the online social network. The socialnetworking server 536 may be accessed by the other components of thenetwork environment either directly or via the network 524.

The social networking server 536 may include an authorization server (orother suitable component(s)) that allows users to opt in to or opt outof having their actions logged by social-networking server 536 or sharedwith other systems (e.g., third-party systems, such as the messagingserver 526), for example, by setting appropriate privacy settings. Aprivacy setting of a user may determine what information associated withthe user may be logged, how information associated with the user may belogged, when information associated with the user may be logged, who maylog information associated with the user, whom information associatedwith the user may be shared with, and for what purposes informationassociated with the user may be logged or shared. Authorization serversmay be used to enforce one or more privacy settings of the users ofsocial-networking server 536 through blocking, data hashing,anonymization, or other suitable techniques as appropriate.

More specifically, one or more of the content objects of the onlinesocial network may be associated with a privacy setting. The privacysettings (or “access settings”) for an object may be stored in anysuitable manner, such as, for example, in association with the object,in an index on an authorization server, in another suitable manner, orany combination thereof. A privacy setting of an object may specify howthe object (or particular information associated with an object) can beaccessed (e.g., viewed or shared) using the online social network. Wherethe privacy settings for an object allow a particular user to accessthat object, the object may be described as being “visible” with respectto that user. As an example and not by way of limitation, a user of theonline social network may specify privacy settings for a user-profilepage identify a set of users that may access the work experienceinformation on the user-profile page, thus excluding other users fromaccessing the information. In particular embodiments, the privacysettings may specify a “blocked list” of users that should not beallowed to access certain information associated with the object. Inother words, the blocked list may specify one or more users or entitiesfor which an object is not visible. As an example and not by way oflimitation, a user may specify a set of users that may not access photosalbums associated with the user, thus excluding those users fromaccessing the photo albums (while also possibly allowing certain usersnot within the set of users to access the photo albums).

In particular embodiments, privacy settings may be associated withparticular elements of the social networking graph 538. Privacy settingsof a social-graph element, such as a node or an edge, may specify howthe social-graph element, information associated with the social-graphelement, or content objects associated with the social-graph element canbe accessed using the online social network. As an example and not byway of limitation, a particular concept node corresponding to aparticular photo may have a privacy setting specifying that the photomay only be accessed by users tagged in the photo and their friends. Inparticular embodiments, privacy settings may allow users to opt in oropt out of having their actions logged by social networking server 536or shared with other systems. In particular embodiments, the privacysettings associated with an object may specify any suitable granularityof permitted access or denial of access. As an example and not by way oflimitation, access or denial of access may be specified for particularusers (e.g., only me, my roommates, and my boss), users within aparticular degrees-of-separation (e.g., friends, or friends-of-friends),user groups (e.g., the gaming club, my family), user networks (e.g.,employees of particular employers, students or alumni of particularuniversity), all users (“public”), no users (“private”), users ofthird-party systems, particular applications (e.g., third-partyapplications, external websites), other suitable users or entities, orany combination thereof. Although this disclosure describes usingparticular privacy settings in a particular manner, this disclosurecontemplates using any suitable privacy settings in any suitable manner.

In response to a request from a user (or other entity) for a particularobject stored in a data store, the social networking server 536 may senda request to the data store for the object. The request may identify theuser associated with the request. The requested data object may only besent to the user (or a client system 510 of the user) if theauthorization server determines that the user is authorized to accessthe object based on the privacy settings associated with the object. Ifthe requesting user is not authorized to access the object, theauthorization server may prevent the requested object from beingretrieved from the data store, or may prevent the requested object frombe sent to the user. In the search query context, an object may only begenerated as a search result if the querying user is authorized toaccess the object. In other words, the object must have a visibilitythat is visible to the querying user. If the object has a visibilitythat is not visible to the user, the object may be excluded from thesearch results.

In some embodiments, targeting criteria may be used to identify users ofthe social network for various purposes. Targeting criteria used toidentify and target users may include explicit, stated user interests onsocial-networking server 536 or explicit connections of a user to anode, object, entity, brand, or page on social networking server 536. Inaddition or as an alternative, such targeting criteria may includeimplicit or inferred user interests or connections (which may includeanalyzing a user's history, demographic, social or other activities,friends' social or other activities, subscriptions, or any of thepreceding of other users similar to the user (based, e.g., on sharedinterests, connections, or events)). Particular embodiments may utilizeplatform targeting, which may involve platform and “like” impressiondata; contextual signals (e.g., “Who is viewing now or has viewedrecently the page for COCA-COLA?”); light-weight connections (e.g.,“check-ins”); connection lookalikes; fans; extracted keywords; EMUadvertising; inferential advertising; coefficients, affinities, or othersocial-graph information; friends-of-friends connections; pinning orboosting; deals; polls; household income, social clusters or groups;products detected in images or other media; social- or open-graph edgetypes; geo-prediction; views of profile or pages; status updates orother user posts (analysis of which may involve natural-languageprocessing or keyword extraction); events information; or collaborativefiltering. Identifying and targeting users may also implicate privacysettings (such as user opt-outs), data hashing, or data anonymization,as appropriate.

The centralized embodiment depicted in FIG. 5A may be well-suited todeployment as a new system or as an upgrade to an existing system,because the logic for applying media effects (e.g., the index generationlogic 532 and/or the index application logic 534) are incorporated intothe communications server 526. In contrast, FIG. 5B depicts an exemplarydistributed communications system 550, in which functionality forrecognizing productive intent and generating a list of suggestedrecipients is distributed and remotely accessible from the messagingserver. Examples of a distributed system 550 include a client-serverarchitecture, a 3-tier architecture, an N-tier architecture, atightly-coupled or clustered architecture, a peer-to-peer architecture,a master-slave architecture, a shared database architecture, and othertypes of distributed systems.

Many of the components depicted in FIG. 5B are identical to those inFIG. 5A, and a description of these elements is not repeated here forthe sake of brevity. The primary difference between the centralizedembodiment and the distributed embodiment is the addition of a separatemedia effect server 552, which hosts index generation logic 532 and theindex application logic 534. The media effect server 552 may be distinctfrom the communications server 526 but may communicate with thecommunications server 526, either directly or through the network 524,to provide the functionality of the index generation logic 532 and theindex application logic 534 to the communications server 526.

The embodiment depicted in FIG. 5B may be particularly well suited toallow exemplary embodiments to be deployed alongside existingcommunications systems, for example when it is difficult or undesirableto replace an existing communications server. Additionally, in somecases the communications server 526 may have limited resources (e.g.processing or memory resources) that limit or preclude the addition ofthe additional pivot functionality. In such situations, the capabilitiesdescribed herein may still be provided through the separate media effectserver 552.

FIG. 5C illustrates an example of a social networking graph 538. Inexemplary embodiments, a social networking service may store one or moresocial graphs 538 in one or more data stores as a social graph datastructure via the social networking service.

The social graph 538 may include multiple nodes, such as user nodes 554and concept nodes 556. The social graph 228 may furthermore includeedges 558 connecting the nodes. The nodes and edges of social graph 228may be stored as data objects, for example, in a data store (such as asocial-graph database). Such a data store may include one or moresearchable or queryable indexes of nodes or edges of social graph 228.

The social graph 538 may be accessed by a social-networking server 226,client system 210, third-party system (e.g., the translation server224), or any other approved system or device for suitable applications.

A user node 554 may correspond to a user of the social-networkingsystem. A user may be an individual (human user), an entity (e.g., anenterprise, business, or third-party application), or a group (e.g., ofindividuals or entities) that interacts or communicates with or over thesocial-networking system. In exemplary embodiments, when a userregisters for an account with the social-networking system, thesocial-networking system may create a user node 554 corresponding to theuser, and store the user node 30 in one or more data stores. Users anduser nodes 554 described herein may, where appropriate, refer toregistered users and user nodes 554 associated with registered users. Inaddition or as an alternative, users and user nodes 554 described hereinmay, where appropriate, refer to users that have not registered with thesocial-networking system. In particular embodiments, a user node 554 maybe associated with information provided by a user or informationgathered by various systems, including the social-networking system. Asan example and not by way of limitation, a user may provide their name,profile picture, contact information, birth date, sex, marital status,family status, employment, education background, preferences, interests,or other demographic information. In particular embodiments, a user node554 may be associated with one or more data objects corresponding toinformation associated with a user. In particular embodiments, a usernode 554 may correspond to one or more webpages. A user node 554 may beassociated with a unique user identifier for the user in thesocial-networking system.

In particular embodiments, a concept node 556 may correspond to aconcept. As an example and not by way of limitation, a concept maycorrespond to a place (such as, for example, a movie theater,restaurant, landmark, or city); a website (such as, for example, awebsite associated with the social-network service or a third-partywebsite associated with a web-application server); an entity (such as,for example, a person, business, group, sports team, or celebrity); aresource (such as, for example, an audio file, video file, digitalphoto, text file, structured document, or application) which may belocated within the social-networking system or on an external server,such as a web-application server; real or intellectual property (suchas, for example, a sculpture, painting, movie, game, song, idea,photograph, or written work); a game; an activity; an idea or theory;another suitable concept; or two or more such concepts. A concept node556 may be associated with information of a concept provided by a useror information gathered by various systems, including thesocial-networking system. As an example and not by way of limitation,information of a concept may include a name or a title; one or moreimages (e.g., an image of the cover page of a book); a location (e.g.,an address or a geographical location); a website (which may beassociated with a URL); contact information (e.g., a phone number or anemail address); other suitable concept information; or any suitablecombination of such information. In particular embodiments, a conceptnode 556 may be associated with one or more data objects correspondingto information associated with concept node 556. In particularembodiments, a concept node 556 may correspond to one or more webpages.

In particular embodiments, a node in social graph 538 may represent orbe represented by a webpage (which may be referred to as a “profilepage”). Profile pages may be hosted by or accessible to thesocial-networking system. Profile pages may also be hosted onthird-party websites associated with a third-party server. As an exampleand not by way of limitation, a profile page corresponding to aparticular external webpage may be the particular external webpage andthe profile page may correspond to a particular concept node 556.Profile pages may be viewable by all or a selected subset of otherusers. As an example and not by way of limitation, a user node 554 mayhave a corresponding user-profile page in which the corresponding usermay add content, make declarations, or otherwise express himself orherself. A business page such as business page 205 may comprise auser-profile page for a commerce entity. As another example and not byway of limitation, a concept node 556 may have a correspondingconcept-profile page in which one or more users may add content, makedeclarations, or express themselves, particularly in relation to theconcept corresponding to concept node 556.

In particular embodiments, a concept node 556 may represent athird-party webpage or resource hosted by a third-party system. Thethird-party webpage or resource may include, among other elements,content, a selectable or other icon, or other inter-actable object(which may be implemented, for example, in JavaScript, AJAX, or PHPcodes) representing an action or activity. As an example and not by wayof limitation, a third-party webpage may include a selectable icon suchas “like,” “check in,” “eat,” “recommend,” or another suitable action oractivity. A user viewing the third-party webpage may perform an actionby selecting one of the icons (e.g., “eat”), causing a client system tosend to the social-networking system a message indicating the user'saction. In response to the message, the social-networking system maycreate an edge (e.g., an “eat” edge) between a user node 554corresponding to the user and a concept node 556 corresponding to thethird-party webpage or resource and store edge 558 in one or more datastores.

In particular embodiments, a pair of nodes in social graph 538 may beconnected to each other by one or more edges 558. An edge 558 connectinga pair of nodes may represent a relationship between the pair of nodes.In particular embodiments, an edge 558 may include or represent one ormore data objects or attributes corresponding to the relationshipbetween a pair of nodes. As an example and not by way of limitation, afirst user may indicate that a second user is a “friend” of the firstuser. In response to this indication, the social-networking system maysend a “friend request” to the second user. If the second user confirmsthe “friend request,” the social-networking system may create an edge558 connecting the first user's user node 554 to the second user's usernode 554 in social graph 538 and store edge 558 as social-graphinformation in one or more data stores. In the example of FIG. 5C,social graph 538 includes an edge 558 indicating a friend relationbetween user nodes 554 of user “Amanda” and user “Dorothy.” Althoughthis disclosure describes or illustrates particular edges 558 withparticular attributes connecting particular user nodes 554, thisdisclosure contemplates any suitable edges 558 with any suitableattributes connecting user nodes 554. As an example and not by way oflimitation, an edge 558 may represent a friendship, family relationship,business or employment relationship, fan relationship, followerrelationship, visitor relationship, subscriber relationship,superior/subordinate relationship, reciprocal relationship,non-reciprocal relationship, another suitable type of relationship, ortwo or more such relationships. Moreover, although this disclosuregenerally describes nodes as being connected, this disclosure alsodescribes users or concepts as being connected. Herein, references tousers or concepts being connected may, where appropriate, refer to thenodes corresponding to those users or concepts being connected in socialgraph 538 by one or more edges 558.

In particular embodiments, an edge 558 between a user node 554 and aconcept node 556 may represent a particular action or activity performedby a user associated with user node 554 toward a concept associated witha concept node 556. As an example and not by way of limitation, asillustrated in FIG. 5C, a user may “like,” “attended,” “played,”“listened,” “cooked,” “worked at,” or “watched” a concept, each of whichmay correspond to a edge type or subtype. A concept-profile pagecorresponding to a concept node 556 may include, for example, aselectable “check in” icon (such as, for example, a clickable “check in”icon) or a selectable “add to favorites” icon. Similarly, after a userclicks these icons, the social-networking system may create a “favorite”edge or a “check in” edge in response to a user's action correspondingto a respective action. As another example and not by way of limitation,a user (user “Carla”) may listen to a particular song (“Across the Sea”)using a particular application (SPOTIFY, which is an online musicapplication). In this case, the social-networking system may create a“listened” edge 558 and a “used” edge (as illustrated in FIG. 5C)between user nodes 554 corresponding to the user and concept nodes 556corresponding to the song and application to indicate that the userlistened to the song and used the application. Moreover, thesocial-networking system may create a “played” edge 558 (as illustratedin FIG. 5C) between concept nodes 556 corresponding to the song and theapplication to indicate that the particular song was played by theparticular application. In this case, “played” edge 558 corresponds toan action performed by an external application (SPOTIFY) on an externalaudio file (the song “Across the Sea”). Although this disclosuredescribes particular edges 558 with particular attributes connectinguser nodes 554 and concept nodes 556, this disclosure contemplates anysuitable edges 558 with any suitable attributes connecting user nodes554 and concept nodes 556. Moreover, although this disclosure describesedges between a user node 554 and a concept node 556 representing asingle relationship, this disclosure contemplates edges between a usernode 554 and a concept node 556 representing one or more relationships.As an example and not by way of limitation, an edge 558 may representboth that a user likes and has used at a particular concept.Alternatively, another edge 558 may represent each type of relationship(or multiples of a single relationship) between a user node 554 and aconcept node 556 (as illustrated in FIG. 5C between user node 554 foruser “Edwin” and concept node 556 for “SPOTIFY”).

In particular embodiments, the social-networking system may create anedge 558 between a user node 554 and a concept node 556 in social graph538. As an example and not by way of limitation, a user viewing aconcept-profile page (such as, for example, by using a web browser or aspecial-purpose application hosted by the user's client system) mayindicate that he or she likes the concept represented by the conceptnode 556 by clicking or selecting a “Like” icon, which may cause theuser's client system to send to the social-networking system a messageindicating the user's liking of the concept associated with theconcept-profile page. In response to the message, the social-networkingsystem may create an edge 558 between user node 554 associated with theuser and concept node 556, as illustrated by “like” edge 558 between theuser and concept node 556. In particular embodiments, thesocial-networking system may store an edge 558 in one or more datastores. In particular embodiments, an edge 558 may be automaticallyformed by the social-networking system in response to a particular useraction. As an example and not by way of limitation, if a first useruploads a picture, watches a movie, or listens to a song, an edge 558may be formed between user node 554 corresponding to the first user andconcept nodes 556 corresponding to those concepts. Although thisdisclosure describes forming particular edges 558 in particular manners,this disclosure contemplates forming any suitable edges 558 in anysuitable manner.

The social graph 538 may further comprise a plurality of product nodes.Product nodes may represent particular products that may be associatedwith a particular business. A business may provide a product catalog toa consumer-to-business service and the consumer-to-business service maytherefore represent each of the products within the product in thesocial graph 538 with each product being in a distinct product node. Aproduct node may comprise information relating to the product, such aspricing information, descriptive information, manufacturer information,availability information, and other relevant information. For example,each of the items on a menu for a restaurant may be represented withinthe social graph 538 with a product node describing each of the items. Aproduct node may be linked by an edge to the business providing theproduct. Where multiple businesses provide a product, each business mayhave a distinct product node associated with its providing of theproduct or may each link to the same product node. A product node may belinked by an edge to each user that has purchased, rated, owns,recommended, or viewed the product, with the edge describing the natureof the relationship (e.g., purchased, rated, owns, recommended, viewed,or other relationship). Each of the product nodes may be associated witha graph id and an associated merchant id by virtue of the linkedmerchant business. Products available from a business may therefore becommunicated to a user by retrieving the available product nodes linkedto the user node for the business within the social graph 538. Theinformation for a product node may be manipulated by thesocial-networking system as a product object that encapsulatesinformation regarding the referenced product.

As such, the social graph 538 may be used to infer shared interests,shared experiences, or other shared or common attributes of two or moreusers of a social-networking system. For instance, two or more userseach having an edge to a common business, product, media item,institution, or other entity represented in the social graph 538 mayindicate a shared relationship with that entity, which may be used tosuggest customization of a use of a social-networking system, includinga messaging system, for one or more users.

The embodiments described above may be performed by a messagingarchitecture, an example of which is next described with reference toFIG. 6.

Messaging Architecture

FIG. 6 illustrates an embodiment of a plurality of servers implementingvarious functions of a messaging service 600. It will be appreciatedthat different distributions of work and functions may be used invarious embodiments of a messaging service 600.

The messaging service 600 may comprise a domain name front end 602. Thedomain name front end 602 may be assigned one or more domain namesassociated with the messaging service 600 in a domain name system (DNS).The domain name front end 602 may receive incoming connections anddistribute the connections to servers providing various messagingservices.

The messaging service 602 may comprise one or more chat servers 604. Thechat servers 604 may comprise front-end servers for receiving andtransmitting user-to-user messaging updates such as chat messages.Incoming connections may be assigned to the chat servers 604 by thedomain name front end 602 based on workload balancing.

The messaging service 600 may comprise backend servers 608. The backendservers 608 may perform specialized tasks in the support of the chatoperations of the front-end chat servers 604. A plurality of differenttypes of backend servers 608 may be used. It will be appreciated thatthe assignment of types of tasks to different backend serves 608 mayvary in different embodiments. In some embodiments some of the back-endservices provided by dedicated servers may be combined onto a singleserver or a set of servers each performing multiple tasks dividedbetween different servers in the embodiment described herein. Similarly,in some embodiments tasks of some of dedicated back-end serversdescribed herein may be divided between different servers of differentserver groups.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more offline storageservers 610. The one or more offline storage servers 610 may storemessaging content for currently-offline messaging clients in hold forwhen the messaging clients reconnect.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more sessions servers 612.The one or more session servers 612 may maintain session state ofconnected messaging clients.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more presence servers 614.The one or more presence servers 614 may maintain presence informationfor the messaging service 600. Presence information may correspond touser-specific information indicating whether or not a given user has anonline messaging client and is available for chatting, has an onlinemessaging client but is currently away from it, does not have an onlinemessaging client, and any other presence state.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more push storage servers616. The one or more push storage servers 616 may cache push requestsand transmit the push requests to messaging clients. Push requests maybe used to wake messaging clients, to notify messaging clients that amessaging update is available, and to otherwise performserver-side-driven interactions with messaging clients.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more group servers 618.The one or more group servers 618 may maintain lists of groups, addusers to groups, remove users from groups, and perform the reception,caching, and forwarding of group chat messages.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more block list servers620. The one or more block list servers 620 may maintain user-specificblock lists, the user-specific incoming-block lists indicating for eachuser the one or more other users that are forbidden from transmittingmessages to that user. Alternatively or additionally, the one or moreblock list servers 620 may maintain user-specific outgoing-block listsindicating for each user the one or more other users that that user isforbidden from transmitting messages to. It will be appreciated thatincoming-block lists and outgoing-block lists may be stored incombination in, for example, a database, with the incoming-block listsand outgoing-block lists representing different views of a samerepository of block information.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more last seen informationservers 622. The one or more last seen information servers 622 mayreceive, store, and maintain information indicating the last seenlocation, status, messaging client, and other elements of a user's lastseen connection to the messaging service 600.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more key servers 624. Theone or more key servers may host public keys for public/private keyencrypted communication.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more profile photo servers626. The one or more profile photo servers 626 may store and makeavailable for retrieval profile photos for the plurality of users of themessaging service 600.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more spam logging servers628. The one or more spam logging servers 628 may log known andsuspected spam (e.g., unwanted messages, particularly those of apromotional nature). The one or more spam logging servers 628 may beoperative to analyze messages to determine whether they are spam and toperform punitive measures, in some embodiments, against suspectedspammers (users that send spam messages).

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more statistics servers630. The one or more statistics servers may compile and store statisticsinformation related to the operation of the messaging service 600 andthe behavior of the users of the messaging service 600.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more web servers 632. Theone or more web servers 632 may engage in hypertext transport protocol(HTTP) and hypertext transport protocol secure (HTTPS) connections withweb browsers.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more chat activitymonitoring servers 634. The one or more chat activity monitoring servers634 may monitor the chats of users to determine unauthorized ordiscouraged behavior by the users of the messaging service 600. The oneor more chat activity monitoring servers 634 may work in cooperationwith the spam logging servers 628 and block list servers 620, with theone or more chat activity monitoring servers 634 identifying spam orother discouraged behavior and providing spam information to the spamlogging servers 628 and blocking information, where appropriate to theblock list servers 620.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more sync servers 636. Theone or more sync servers 636 may sync the messaging system 500 withcontact information from a messaging client, such as an address book ona mobile phone, to determine contacts for a user in the messagingservice 600.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more multimedia servers638. The one or more multimedia servers may store multimedia (e.g.,images, video, audio) in transit between messaging clients, multimediacached for offline endpoints, and may perform transcoding of multimedia.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more payment servers 640.The one or more payment servers 640 may process payments from users. Theone or more payment servers 640 may connect to external third-partyservers for the performance of payments.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more registration servers642. The one or more registration servers 642 may register new users ofthe messaging service 600.

The messaging service 600 may comprise one or more voice relay servers644. The one or more voice relay servers 644 may relayvoice-over-internet-protocol (VoIP) voice communication betweenmessaging clients for the performance of VoIP calls.

The above-described methods may be embodied as instructions on acomputer readable medium or as part of a computing architecture. FIG. 7illustrates an embodiment of an exemplary computing architecture 700suitable for implementing various embodiments as previously described.In one embodiment, the computing architecture 700 may comprise or beimplemented as part of an electronic device, such as a computer 701. Theembodiments are not limited in this context.

As used in this application, the terms “system” and “component” areintended to refer to a computer-related entity, either hardware, acombination of hardware and software, software, or software inexecution, examples of which are provided by the exemplary computingarchitecture 700. For example, a component can be, but is not limited tobeing, a process running on a processor, a processor, a hard disk drive,multiple storage drives (of optical and/or magnetic storage medium), anobject, an executable, a thread of execution, a program, and/or acomputer. By way of illustration, both an application running on aserver and the server can be a component. One or more components canreside within a process and/or thread of execution, and a component canbe localized on one computer and/or distributed between two or morecomputers. Further, components may be communicatively coupled to eachother by various types of communications media to coordinate operations.The coordination may involve the uni-directional or bi-directionalexchange of information. For instance, the components may communicateinformation in the form of signals communicated over the communicationsmedia. The information can be implemented as signals allocated tovarious signal lines. In such allocations, each message is a signal.Further embodiments, however, may alternatively employ data messages.Such data messages may be sent across various connections. Exemplaryconnections include parallel interfaces, serial interfaces, and businterfaces.

The computing architecture 700 includes various common computingelements, such as one or more processors, multi-core processors,co-processors, memory units, chipsets, controllers, peripherals,interfaces, oscillators, timing devices, video cards, audio cards,multimedia input/output (I/O) components, power supplies, and so forth.The embodiments, however, are not limited to implementation by thecomputing architecture 700.

As shown in FIG. 7, the computing architecture 700 comprises aprocessing unit 702, a system memory 704 and a system bus 706. Theprocessing unit 702 can be any of various commercially availableprocessors, including without limitation an AMD® Athlon®, Duron® andOpteron® processors; ARM® application, embedded and secure processors;IBM® and Motorola® DragonBall® and PowerPC® processors; IBM and Sony®Cell processors; Intel® Celeron®, Core (2) Duo®, Itanium®, Pentium®,Xeon®, and XScale® processors; and similar processors. Dualmicroprocessors, multi-core processors, and other multi-processorarchitectures may also be employed as the processing unit 702.

The system bus 706 provides an interface for system componentsincluding, but not limited to, the system memory 704 to the processingunit 702. The system bus 706 can be any of several types of busstructure that may further interconnect to a memory bus (with or withouta memory controller), a peripheral bus, and a local bus using any of avariety of commercially available bus architectures. Interface adaptersmay connect to the system bus 706 via a slot architecture. Example slotarchitectures may include without limitation Accelerated Graphics Port(AGP), Card Bus, (Extended) Industry Standard Architecture ((E)ISA),Micro Channel Architecture (MCA), NuBus, Peripheral ComponentInterconnect (Extended) (PCI(X)), PCI Express, Personal Computer MemoryCard International Association (PCMCIA), and the like.

The computing architecture 700 may comprise or implement variousarticles of manufacture. An article of manufacture may comprise acomputer-readable storage medium to store logic. Examples of acomputer-readable storage medium may include any tangible media capableof storing electronic data, including volatile memory or non-volatilememory, removable or non-removable memory, erasable or non-erasablememory, writeable or re-writeable memory, and so forth. Examples oflogic may include executable computer program instructions implementedusing any suitable type of code, such as source code, compiled code,interpreted code, executable code, static code, dynamic code,object-oriented code, visual code, and the like. Embodiments may also beat least partly implemented as instructions contained in or on anon-transitory computer-readable medium, which may be read and executedby one or more processors to enable performance of the operationsdescribed herein.

The system memory 704 may include various types of computer-readablestorage media in the form of one or more higher speed memory units, suchas read-only memory (ROM), random-access memory (RAM), dynamic RAM(DRAM), Double-Data-Rate DRAM (DDRAM), synchronous DRAM (SDRAM), staticRAM (SRAM), programmable ROM (PROM), erasable programmable ROM (EPROM),electrically erasable programmable ROM (EEPROM), flash memory, polymermemory such as ferroelectric polymer memory, ovonic memory, phase changeor ferroelectric memory, silicon-oxide-nitride-oxide-silicon (SONOS)memory, magnetic or optical cards, an array of devices such as RedundantArray of Independent Disks (RAID) drives, solid state memory devices(e.g., USB memory, solid state drives (SSD) and any other type ofstorage media suitable for storing information. In the illustratedembodiment shown in FIG. 7, the system memory 704 can includenon-volatile memory 708 and/or volatile memory 710. A basic input/outputsystem (BIOS) can be stored in the non-volatile memory 708.

The computing architecture 700 may include various types ofcomputer-readable storage media in the form of one or more lower speedmemory units, including an internal (or external) hard disk drive (HDD)712, a magnetic floppy disk drive (FDD) 714 to read from or write to aremovable magnetic disk 716, and an optical disk drive 718 to read fromor write to a removable optical disk 720 (e.g., a CD-ROM or DVD). TheHDD 712, FDD 714 and optical disk drive 720 can be connected to thesystem bus 706 by an HDD interface 722, an FDD interface 724 and anoptical drive interface 726, respectively. The HDD interface 722 forexternal drive implementations can include at least one or both ofUniversal Serial Bus (USB) and IEEE 694 interface technologies.

The drives and associated computer-readable media provide volatileand/or nonvolatile storage of data, data structures, computer-executableinstructions, and so forth. For example, a number of program modules canbe stored in the drives and memory units 708, 712, including anoperating system 728, one or more application programs 730, otherprogram modules 732, and program data 734. In one embodiment, the one ormore application programs 730, other program modules 732, and programdata 734 can include, for example, the various applications and/orcomponents of the messaging system 500.

A user can enter commands and information into the computer 701 throughone or more wire/wireless input devices, for example, a keyboard 736 anda pointing device, such as a mouse 738. Other input devices may includemicrophones, infra-red (IR) remote controls, radio-frequency (RF) remotecontrols, game pads, stylus pens, card readers, dongles, finger printreaders, gloves, graphics tablets, joysticks, keyboards, retina readers,touch screens (e.g., capacitive, resistive, etc.), trackballs,trackpads, sensors, styluses, and the like. These and other inputdevices are often connected to the processing unit 702 through an inputdevice interface 740 that is coupled to the system bus 706, but can beconnected by other interfaces such as a parallel port, IEEE 694 serialport, a game port, a USB port, an IR interface, and so forth.

A monitor 742 or other type of display device is also connected to thesystem bus 706 via an interface, such as a video adaptor 744. Themonitor 742 may be internal or external to the computer 701. In additionto the monitor 742, a computer typically includes other peripheraloutput devices, such as speakers, printers, and so forth.

The computer 701 may operate in a networked environment using logicalconnections via wire and/or wireless communications to one or moreremote computers, such as a remote computer 744. The remote computer 744can be a workstation, a server computer, a router, a personal computer,portable computer, microprocessor-based entertainment appliance, a peerdevice or other common network node, and typically includes many or allof the elements described relative to the computer 701, although, forpurposes of brevity, only a memory/storage device 746 is illustrated.The logical connections depicted include wire/wireless connectivity to alocal area network (LAN) 748 and/or larger networks, for example, a widearea network (WAN) 750. Such LAN and WAN networking environments arecommonplace in offices and companies, and facilitate enterprise-widecomputer networks, such as intranets, all of which may connect to aglobal communications network, for example, the Internet.

When used in a LAN networking environment, the computer 701 is connectedto the LAN 748 through a wire and/or wireless communication networkinterface or adaptor 752. The adaptor 752 can facilitate wire and/orwireless communications to the LAN 748, which may also include awireless access point disposed thereon for communicating with thewireless functionality of the adaptor 752.

When used in a WAN networking environment, the computer 701 can includea modem 754, or is connected to a communications server on the WAN 750,or has other means for establishing communications over the WAN 750,such as by way of the Internet. The modem 754, which can be internal orexternal and a wire and/or wireless device, connects to the system bus706 via the input device interface 740. In a networked environment,program modules depicted relative to the computer 701, or portionsthereof, can be stored in the remote memory/storage device 746. It willbe appreciated that the network connections shown are exemplary andother means of establishing a communications link between the computerscan be used.

The computer 701 is operable to communicate with wire and wirelessdevices or entities using the IEEE 802 family of standards, such aswireless devices operatively disposed in wireless communication (e.g.,IEEE 802.13 over-the-air modulation techniques). This includes at leastWi-Fi (or Wireless Fidelity), WiMax, and Bluetooth™ wirelesstechnologies, among others. Thus, the communication can be a predefinedstructure as with a conventional network or simply an ad hoccommunication between at least two devices. Wi-Fi networks use radiotechnologies called IEEE 802.13x (a, b, g, n, etc.) to provide secure,reliable, fast wireless connectivity. A Wi-Fi network can be used toconnect computers to each other, to the Internet, and to wire networks(which use IEEE 802.3-related media and functions).

FIG. 8 is a block diagram depicting an exemplary communicationsarchitecture 800 suitable for implementing various embodiments aspreviously described. The communications architecture 800 includesvarious common communications elements, such as a transmitter, receiver,transceiver, radio, network interface, baseband processor, antenna,amplifiers, filters, power supplies, and so forth. The embodiments,however, are not limited to implementation by the communicationsarchitecture 800.

As shown in FIG. 8, the communications architecture 800 includes one ormore clients 802 and servers 804. The clients 802 may implement theclient device 510. The servers 804 may implement the server device 526.The clients 802 and the servers 804 are operatively connected to one ormore respective client data stores 806 and server data stores 808 thatcan be employed to store information local to the respective clients 802and servers 804, such as cookies and/or associated contextualinformation.

The clients 802 and the servers 804 may communicate information betweeneach other using a communication framework 810. The communicationsframework 810 may implement any well-known communications techniques andprotocols. The communications framework 810 may be implemented as apacket-switched network (e.g., public networks such as the Internet,private networks such as an enterprise intranet, and so forth), acircuit-switched network (e.g., the public switched telephone network),or a combination of a packet-switched network and a circuit-switchednetwork (with suitable gateways and translators).

The communications framework 810 may implement various networkinterfaces arranged to accept, communicate, and connect to acommunications network. A network interface may be regarded as aspecialized form of an input output interface. Network interfaces mayemploy connection protocols including without limitation direct connect,Ethernet (e.g., thick, thin, twisted pair 10/100/1000 Base T, and thelike), token ring, wireless network interfaces, cellular networkinterfaces, IEEE 802.8a-x network interfaces, IEEE 802.16 networkinterfaces, IEEE 802.20 network interfaces, and the like. Further,multiple network interfaces may be used to engage with variouscommunications network types. For example, multiple network interfacesmay be employed to allow for the communication over broadcast,multicast, and unicast networks. Should processing requirements dictatea greater amount speed and capacity, distributed network controllerarchitectures may similarly be employed to pool, load balance, andotherwise increase the communicative bandwidth required by clients 802and the servers 804. A communications network may be any one and thecombination of wired and/or wireless networks including withoutlimitation a direct interconnection, a secured custom connection, aprivate network (e.g., an enterprise intranet), a public network (e.g.,the Internet), a Personal Area Network (PAN), a Local Area Network(LAN), a Metropolitan Area Network (MAN), an Operating Missions as Nodeson the Internet (OMNI), a Wide Area Network (WAN), a wireless network, acellular network, and other communications networks.

FIG. 9 illustrates an embodiment of a device 900 for use in amulticarrier OFDM system, such as the messaging system 500. The device900 may implement, for example, software components 902 as describedwith reference to the messaging component logic 600, the intentdetermination logic 700, and the group selection logic 800. The device900 may also implement a logic circuit 904. The logic circuit 904 mayinclude physical circuits to perform operations described for themessaging system 600. As shown in FIG. 9, device 900 may include a radiointerface 906, baseband circuitry 908, and a computing platform 910,although embodiments are not limited to this configuration.

The device 900 may implement some or all of the structure and/oroperations for the messaging system 500 and/or logic circuit 904 in asingle computing entity, such as entirely within a single device.Alternatively, the device 900 may distribute portions of the structureand/or operations for the messaging system 600 and/or logic circuit 904across multiple computing entities using a distributed systemarchitecture, such as a client-server architecture, a 3-tierarchitecture, an N-tier architecture, a tightly-coupled or clusteredarchitecture, a peer-to-peer architecture, a master-slave architecture,a shared database architecture, and other types of distributed systems.The embodiments are not limited in this context.

In one embodiment, the radio interface 906 may include a component orcombination of components adapted for transmitting and/or receivingsingle carrier or multi-carrier modulated signals (e.g., includingcomplementary code keying (CCK) and/or orthogonal frequency divisionmultiplexing (OFDM) symbols) although the embodiments are not limited toany specific over-the-air interface or modulation scheme. The radiointerface 906 may include, for example, a receiver 912, a transmitter914 and/or a frequency synthesizer 916. The radio interface 906 mayinclude bias controls, a crystal oscillator and/or one or more antennas918. In another embodiment, the radio interface 906 may use externalvoltage-controlled oscillators (VCOs), surface acoustic wave filters,intermediate frequency (IF) filters and/or RF filters, as desired. Dueto the variety of potential RF interface designs an expansivedescription thereof is omitted.

The baseband circuitry 908 may communicate with the radio interface 906to process receive and/or transmit signals and may include, for example,an analog-to-digital converter 920 for down converting received signals,and a digital-to-analog converter 922 for up-converting signals fortransmission. Further, the baseband circuitry 908 may include a basebandor physical layer (PHY) processing circuit 924 for PHY link layerprocessing of respective receive/transmit signals. The basebandcircuitry 908 may include, for example, a processing circuit 926 formedium access control (MAC)/data link layer processing. The basebandcircuitry 908 may include a memory controller 928 for communicating withthe processing circuit 926 and/or a computing platform 910, for example,via one or more interfaces 930.

In some embodiments, the PHY processing circuit 924 may include a frameconstruction and/or detection module, in combination with additionalcircuitry such as a buffer memory, to construct and/or deconstructcommunication frames, such as radio frames. Alternatively or inaddition, the MAC processing circuit 926 may share processing forcertain of these functions or perform these processes independent of thePHY processing circuit 924. In some embodiments, MAC and PHY processingmay be integrated into a single circuit.

The computing platform 910 may provide computing functionality for thedevice 900. As shown, the computing platform 910 may include aprocessing component 932. In addition to, or alternatively of, thebaseband circuitry 908, the device 900 may execute processing operationsor logic for the messaging system 500 and logic circuit 904 using theprocessing component 932. The processing component 932 (and/or the PHY924 and/or MAC 926) may comprise various hardware elements, softwareelements, or a combination of both. Examples of hardware elements mayinclude devices, logic devices, components, processors, microprocessors,circuits, processor circuits, circuit elements (e.g., transistors,resistors, capacitors, inductors, and so forth), integrated circuits,application specific integrated circuits (ASIC), programmable logicdevices (PLD), digital signal processors (DSP), field programmable gatearray (FPGA), memory units, logic gates, registers, semiconductordevice, chips, microchips, chip sets, and so forth. Examples of softwareelements may include software components, programs, applications,computer programs, application programs, system programs, softwaredevelopment programs, machine programs, operating system software,middleware, firmware, software modules, routines, subroutines,functions, methods, procedures, software interfaces, application programinterfaces (API), instruction sets, computing code, computer code, codesegments, computer code segments, words, values, symbols, or anycombination thereof. Determining whether an embodiment is implementedusing hardware elements and/or software elements may vary in accordancewith any number of factors, such as desired computational rate, powerlevels, heat tolerances, processing cycle budget, input data rates,output data rates, memory resources, data bus speeds and other design orperformance constraints, as desired for a given implementation.

The computing platform 910 may further include other platform components934. Other platform components 934 include common computing elements,such as one or more processors, multi-core processors, co-processors,memory units, chipsets, controllers, peripherals, interfaces,oscillators, timing devices, video cards, audio cards, multimediainput/output (I/O) components (e.g., digital displays), power supplies,and so forth. Examples of memory units may include without limitationvarious types of computer readable and machine readable storage media inthe form of one or more higher speed memory units, such as read-onlymemory (ROM), random-access memory (RAM), dynamic RAM (DRAM),Double-Data-Rate DRAM (DDRAM), synchronous DRAM (SDRAM), static RAM(SRAM), programmable ROM (PROM), erasable programmable ROM (EPROM),electrically erasable programmable ROM (EEPROM), flash memory, polymermemory such as ferroelectric polymer memory, ovonic memory, phase changeor ferroelectric memory, silicon-oxide-nitride-oxide-silicon (SONOS)memory, magnetic or optical cards, an array of devices such as RedundantArray of Independent Disks (RAID) drives, solid state memory devices(e.g., USB memory, solid state drives (SSD) and any other type ofstorage media suitable for storing information.

The device 900 may be, for example, an ultra-mobile device, a mobiledevice, a fixed device, a machine-to-machine (M2M) device, a personaldigital assistant (PDA), a mobile computing device, a smart phone, atelephone, a digital telephone, a cellular telephone, user equipment,eBook readers, a handset, a one-way pager, a two-way pager, a messagingdevice, a computer, a personal computer (PC), a desktop computer, alaptop computer, a notebook computer, a netbook computer, a handheldcomputer, a tablet computer, a server, a server array or server farm, aweb server, a network server, an Internet server, a work station, amini-computer, a main frame computer, a supercomputer, a networkappliance, a web appliance, a distributed computing system,multiprocessor systems, processor-based systems, consumer electronics,programmable consumer electronics, game devices, television, digitaltelevision, set top box, wireless access point, base station, node B,evolved node B (eNB), subscriber station, mobile subscriber center,radio network controller, router, hub, gateway, bridge, switch, machine,or combination thereof. Accordingly, functions and/or specificconfigurations of the device 900 described herein, may be included oromitted in various embodiments of the device 900, as suitably desired.In some embodiments, the device 900 may be configured to be compatiblewith protocols and frequencies associated one or more of the 3GPP LTESpecifications and/or IEEE 1402.16 Standards for WMANs, and/or otherbroadband wireless networks, cited herein, although the embodiments arenot limited in this respect.

Embodiments of device 900 may be implemented using single input singleoutput (SISO) architectures. However, certain implementations mayinclude multiple antennas (e.g., antennas 918) for transmission and/orreception using adaptive antenna techniques for beamforming or spatialdivision multiple access (SDMA) and/or using MIMO communicationtechniques.

The components and features of the device 900 may be implemented usingany combination of discrete circuitry, application specific integratedcircuits (ASICs), logic gates and/or single chip architectures. Further,the features of the device 900 may be implemented usingmicrocontrollers, programmable logic arrays and/or microprocessors orany combination of the foregoing where suitably appropriate. It is notedthat hardware, firmware and/or software elements may be collectively orindividually referred to herein as “logic” or “circuit.”

It will be appreciated that the exemplary device 900 shown in the blockdiagram of FIG. 9 may represent one functionally descriptive example ofmany potential implementations. Accordingly, division, omission orinclusion of block functions depicted in the accompanying figures doesnot infer that the hardware components, circuits, software and/orelements for implementing these functions would be necessarily bedivided, omitted, or included in embodiments.

At least one computer-readable storage medium 936 may includeinstructions that, when executed, cause a system to perform any of thecomputer-implemented methods described herein.

General Notes on Terminology

Some embodiments may be described using the expression “one embodiment”or “an embodiment” along with their derivatives. These terms mean that aparticular feature, structure, or characteristic described in connectionwith the embodiment is included in at least one embodiment. Theappearances of the phrase “in one embodiment” in various places in thespecification are not necessarily all referring to the same embodiment.Moreover, unless otherwise noted the features described above arerecognized to be usable together in any combination. Thus, any featuresdiscussed separately may be employed in combination with each otherunless it is noted that the features are incompatible with each other.

With general reference to notations and nomenclature used herein, thedetailed descriptions herein may be presented in terms of programprocedures executed on a computer or network of computers. Theseprocedural descriptions and representations are used by those skilled inthe art to most effectively convey the substance of their work to othersskilled in the art.

A procedure is here, and generally, conceived to be a self-consistentsequence of operations leading to a desired result. These operations arethose requiring physical manipulations of physical quantities. Usually,though not necessarily, these quantities take the form of electrical,magnetic or optical signals capable of being stored, transferred,combined, compared, and otherwise manipulated. It proves convenient attimes, principally for reasons of common usage, to refer to thesesignals as bits, values, elements, symbols, characters, terms, numbers,or the like. It should be noted, however, that all of these and similarterms are to be associated with the appropriate physical quantities andare merely convenient labels applied to those quantities.

Further, the manipulations performed are often referred to in terms,such as adding or comparing, which are commonly associated with mentaloperations performed by a human operator. No such capability of a humanoperator is necessary, or desirable in most cases, in any of theoperations described herein, which form part of one or more embodiments.Rather, the operations are machine operations. Useful machines forperforming operations of various embodiments include general purposedigital computers or similar devices.

Some embodiments may be described using the expression “coupled” and“connected” along with their derivatives. These terms are notnecessarily intended as synonyms for each other. For example, someembodiments may be described using the terms “connected” and/or“coupled” to indicate that two or more elements are in direct physicalor electrical contact with each other. The term “coupled,” however, mayalso mean that two or more elements are not in direct contact with eachother, but yet still co-operate or interact with each other.

Various embodiments also relate to apparatus or systems for performingthese operations. This apparatus may be specially constructed for therequired purpose or it may comprise a general purpose computer asselectively activated or reconfigured by a computer program stored inthe computer. The procedures presented herein are not inherently relatedto a particular computer or other apparatus. Various general purposemachines may be used with programs written in accordance with theteachings herein, or it may prove convenient to construct morespecialized apparatus to perform the required method steps. The requiredstructure for a variety of these machines will appear from thedescription given.

It is emphasized that the Abstract of the Disclosure is provided toallow a reader to quickly ascertain the nature of the technicaldisclosure. It is submitted with the understanding that it will not beused to interpret or limit the scope or meaning of the claims. Inaddition, in the foregoing Detailed Description, it can be seen thatvarious features are grouped together in a single embodiment for thepurpose of streamlining the disclosure. This method of disclosure is notto be interpreted as reflecting an intention that the claimedembodiments require more features than are expressly recited in eachclaim. Rather, as the following claims reflect, inventive subject matterlies in less than all features of a single disclosed embodiment. Thusthe following claims are hereby incorporated into the DetailedDescription, with each claim standing on its own as a separateembodiment. In the appended claims, the terms “including” and “in which”are used as the plain-English equivalents of the respective terms“comprising” and “wherein,” respectively. Moreover, the terms “first,”“second,” “third,” and so forth, are used merely as labels, and are notintended to impose numerical requirements on their objects.

What has been described above includes examples of the disclosedarchitecture. It is, of course, not possible to describe everyconceivable combination of components and/or methodologies, but one ofordinary skill in the art may recognize that many further combinationsand permutations are possible. Accordingly, the novel architecture isintended to embrace all such alterations, modifications and variationsthat fall within the spirit and scope of the appended claims.

The invention claimed is:
 1. A computer-implemented method, comprising aprocessor configured to execute: receiving, by a media effect server,one or more frames of a group video conversation; applying, by the mediaeffect server, a media effect to the one or more frames, the mediaeffect altering the one or more frames of the group video conversation,the media effect comprising one or more of an overlay, a filter and asound; accessing a media effect index for tracking application of mediaeffects in the group video conversation; recording information regardingthe applied media effect in the media effect index, including at leastthe time in the video conversation that the media effect was applied;receiving a request for information regarding some or all of the trackedmedia effects in the media effect index; and transmitting the requestedinformation.
 2. The method of claim 1, the request for information beinga request to identify an insertion point for a media item, the insertionpoint identified based on a distribution of the media effects in thegroup conversation.
 3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:identifying an application of a media effect in the media effect index;and correlating the applied media effect to an event in the groupconversation.
 4. The method of claim 3, further comprising adding theevent to a highlights reel of the group conversation.
 5. The method ofclaim 1, wherein the video conversation is a group video call, furthercomprising: receiving an instruction to replay the group video call;receiving an instruction to skip ahead to a time corresponding to anapplication of a media effect; consulting the media effect index toidentify a point in the group video call corresponding to the time; andsetting a playback time in the replay of the group video call to theidentified point.
 6. The method of claim 1, wherein the videoconversation is a group video call, further comprising: receiving aninstruction to search the group video call for an event corresponding toan application of a media effect; consulting the media effect index toidentify a point in the group video call corresponding to the event; andreturning a time in the group video corresponding to the identifiedpoint.
 7. The method of claim 1, wherein the group video conversation isa panel discussion, further comprising automatically detecting a time inthe panel discussion where a specified participant spoke based on theapplication of the media effect to the one or more frames in the groupvideo conversation wherein the specified participant was speaking.
 8. Anon-transitory, computer-readable medium storing instructions configuredto cause one or more processors to: receive one or more frames of agroup video conversation; apply a media effect to the one or moreframes, the media effect altering the one or more frames of the groupvideo conversation, the media effect comprising one or more of anoverlay, a filter and the sound; access a media effect index fortracking application of media effects in the group video conversation;record information regarding the applied media effect in the mediaeffect index, the information including at least the time in the videoconversation that the media effect was applied; receive a request forinformation regarding some or all of the tracked media effects in themedia effect index; and transmit the requested information.
 9. Themedium of claim 8, the request for information being a request toidentify an insertion point for a media item, the insertion pointidentified based on a distribution of the media effects in the groupconversation.
 10. The medium of claim 8, further comprising: identifyingan application of a media effect in the media effect index; andcorrelating the applied media effect to an event in the groupconversation.
 11. The medium of claim 10, further comprising adding theevent to a highlights reel of the group conversation.
 12. The medium ofclaim 8, wherein the video conversation is a group video call, furthercomprising: receiving an instruction to replay the group video call;receiving an instruction to skip ahead to a time corresponding to anapplication of a media effect; consulting the media effect index toidentify a point in the group video call corresponding to the time; andsetting a playback time in the replay of the group video call to theidentified point.
 13. The medium of claim 8, wherein the videoconversation is a group video call, further comprising: receiving aninstruction to search the group video call for an event corresponding toan application of a media effect; consulting the media effect index toidentify a point in the group video call corresponding to the event; andreturning a time in the group video corresponding to the identifiedpoint.
 14. The medium of claim 8, wherein the group video conversationis a panel discussion, further comprising automatically detecting a timein the panel discussion where a specified participant spoke based on theapplication of the media effect to the one or more frames in the groupvideo wherein the specified participant was speaking.
 15. A systemcomprising: a non-transitory, computer readable medium storinginstructions for facilitating a group video conversation; and aprocessor configured to execute the instructions, the instructionsconfigured to cause the processor to: receive one or more frames of agroup video conversation; apply a media effect to the one or moreframes, the media effect altering the one or more frames of the groupvideo conversation, the media effect comprising one or more of anoverlay, a filter and a sound; access a media effect index for trackingapplication of media effects in the group video conversation; recordinformation regarding the applied media effect in the media effectindex, the information including at least the time in the videoconversation that the media effect was applied; receive a request forinformation regarding some or all of the tracked media effects in themedia effect index; and transmit the requested information.
 16. Thesystem of claim 15, the request for information being a request toidentify an insertion point for a media item, the insertion pointidentified based on a distribution of the media effects in the groupconversation.
 17. The system of claim 15, further comprising:identifying an application of a media effect in the media effect index;correlating the applied media effect to an event in the groupconversation; and adding the event to a highlights reel of the groupconversation.
 18. The system of claim 15, wherein the video conversationis a group video call, further comprising: receiving an instruction toreplay the group video call; receiving an instruction to skip ahead to atime corresponding to an application of a media effect; consulting themedia effect index to identify a point in the group video callcorresponding to the time; and setting a playback time in the replay ofthe group video call to the identified point.
 19. The system of claim15, wherein the video conversation is a group video call, furthercomprising: receiving an instruction to search the group video call foran event corresponding to an application of a media effect; consultingthe media effect index to identify a point in the group video callcorresponding to the event; and returning a time in the group videocorresponding to the identified point.
 20. The system of claim 15,wherein the group video conversation is a panel discussion, furthercomprising automatically detecting a time in the panel discussion wherea specified participant spoke based on the application of the mediaeffect to the one or more frames in the group video wherein thespecified participant was speaking.